WASHINGTON — It’s not just honey bees that are in trouble. The fuzzy American bumblebee seems to
be disappearing in the Midwest.

Two recent studies in the journal
Science conclude that wild bees, such as the American bumblebee, are increasingly
important in pollinating flowers and crops that provide us with food. And, at least in the Midwest,
they seem to be dwindling in an alarming manner, possibly from disease and parasites.

Wild bees are difficult to track, so scientists have had a hard time knowing what’s happening to
them. But because of one man in a small town in Illinois in the 1890s, researchers now have a
better clue.

Naturalist Charles Robertson went out daily in a horse-drawn buggy and meticulously collected
and categorized insects in Carlinville in southern Illinois.

More than a century later, Laura Burkle of Montana State University went back to see what had
changed. Burkle and her colleagues reported that they could find only half the species of wild bees
that Robertson found — 54 of 109 types.

“That’s a significant decline. It’s a scary decline,” Burkle said.

And what’s most noticeable is the near absence of one particular species, the yellow-and-black
American bumblebee. There are 4,000 species of wild bees in America, and 49 of them are
bumblebees.

In the Midwest, the most common bee has been
Bombus pensylvanicus, known as the American bumblebee. But in 447 hours of searching,
Burkle’s team found one American bumblebee, a queen.

Scientists suspect a combination of disease and parasites for the dwindling of both wild and
domesticated bees.